Η ΚΑΘΗΜΕΡΙΝΗ

The news was finally announced a few days ago. Although Greece has struggled for years to attract (or retain) investments, the innovative American electric vehicle manufacturer Tesla is planning to create a small research and development division in Athens, which will probably consist of a team of around 10 members. It will be housed in the Science and Technology Park at the Demokritos National Center of Scientific Research and will focus on the design of electric engines.

To find out how the project came about, Kathimerini went to the NTUA’s School of Electrical and Computer Engineering. Behind Tesla’s choice lie the stories of students and teachers who took initiatives, put their leisure time to good use and were not content with the narrow limits of the theoretical academic approach. A spokesman for the American company admitted that there is a large pool of talent in Greece.

At the vanguard

Professor Antonios Kladas was fortunate to see first Laskaris and then three more former students join Tesla’s engineering team. “Kostis represents the vanguard,” he told Kathimerini.

He spoke without pauses, obviously excited, about the past and the present of the Laboratory of Electric Machines, where he works. He explained that, initially, Laskaris had shown an interest in telecommunications, which offered great opportunities in the 1990s due to the liberalization of the market. So when he proposed that he would focus on electric power in his thesis, Kladas had felt uncertain about his choice. “You aren’t very energy-focused,” he had told him back then.

That wasn’t the first time his student surprised him.

Laskaris focused on permanent-magnet motors, today found in most electric vehicles. He completed his dissertation in three and a half years. In 2008, Laskaris co-founded the Prometheus Research Team at the NTUA. Participation was and remains voluntary and does not guarantee grades. In their spare time, students build entirely electric-powered vehicles to take part in the Shell Eco-Marathon Europe competition, in which student teams around the world design, build, test and drive ultra-energy-efficient vehicles.

They participated for the first time in 2009. A last-minute mechanical failure in the engine power supply system left the team out of the competition because they could not get the necessary spare parts in time. After this baptism by fire, however, they returned stronger, and scored successes in the coming years.

“He created a group of people who, along with their educational activities, can also do research. The school honors this excellence and progress,” said Kladas.

Three years later, Laskaris moved to Palo Alto in California, and has since been working as the head of the Tesla’s electric engine design team. Vasilis Papanikolaou first met Laskaris at the NTUA and was on the Prometheus team with him. After completing his own postgraduate studies in the Netherlands, he also joined Tesla in December 2014.

At first Laskaris’s team was small, consisting of three Greeks and one American. New members joined them later. Papanikolaou remained with the company until November 2017, when he left to turn his attention to artificial intelligence.

“I was impressed by how committed they all were to their goal. I really liked the way we worked, how much trust there was between the company and every employee. How much responsibility we were given, but also the chance to do something new,” said Papanikolaou, now 29, when we met him at his home in Kifissia, northern Athens.

He remembers that working hours in Palo Alto were flexible, oriented toward the essence of the work. “Nobody cared how many hours you worked,” he said, adding that the company had open-plan offices where all staff had direct contact with all the executives. Even the office of the company’s chairman and CEO, Elon Musk, was open, he added.

The new model

Papanikolaou helped to design Tesla’s Model 3 sedan, which was released a few months ago. “I worked on machine modeling, the software we developed and the design,” he told Kathimerini. The standard Model 3 has a range of 354 kilometers, while the most expensive version can travel 498 km before it needs recharging. Its maximum speed exceeds 200 km per hour and the cost of the basic model starts from $35,000.

“It was made to be more affordable and at the same time to have a performance the same as or better than a car with an internal combustion engine. And the way of driving is also quite different, without being too strange,” said Papanikolaou.

In 2019, Tesla plans to start production of its first electric truck with an 800 km range. The innovative company, however, is not limited to building vehicles. Among other things, it has created rechargeable lithium-ion battery stationary energy storage products for use at home.

Musk has also entered the space race. Recently, SpaceX launched its powerful Falcon Heavy rocket, sending a model of Tesla’s Roadster out toward the asteroid belt. Musk’s vision is to send people to Mars in the future.